BD most attractive investment destination in Southeast Asia: Gowher

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UNB, Singapore :
Prime Minister’s Foreign Affairs Adviser Dr Gowher Rizvi at a summit here on Thursday said Bangladesh is now the most attractive and potential destination for investment in Southeast Asia as it has a stable GDP growth rate for the last one decade.
“Bangladesh is truly moving forward and proving herself as the most vibrant and potential destination for investment in Southeast Asia as the country is achieving a stable GDP growth over 6 percent for the last one decade,” he said.
Gowher Rizvi made the remarks in his keynote paper at the second Bangladesh Investment Summit, Asia, organised by Finance Asia, according to a message received here.
The main slogan of the summit was ‘Unlocking Opportunities for Asia’s Investors’.
Standard Chartered Bank (SCB), The City Bank LTD, LR Global, Eastern Bank Ltd, Lanka Bangla Securities, BRACK EPL and DFDL sponsored the summit while Channel i and The Daily Star were the media partners of it.
Gowher Rizvi focused on the challenges and future of Bangladesh, its forex reserve, export growth, remittance earnings from 10 million people working outside, the balance of payment and growing power generation.
The PM’s Adviser also highlighted Bangladesh’s geographical location and recent settlement of maritime boundary with India and Myanmar which will help invest in natural resources.
He also focused on Bangladesh’s growing domestic market of 160 million people in addition to 70 million of the eastern region of India.
Responding to a question about Dhaka-Chittagong connectivity, the PM’s Adviser said the government is trying to complete the work on the four-lane Dhaka-Chittagong highway within the next six months.
He also mentioned the nation’s efforts for building the much-hyped Padma Bridge with its own fund, and said the government is sincerely working to improve the rail and river connectivity.
Replying to another question, Rizvi lamented that there are so many issues to promote Bangladesh, but those are not getting the due focus.
A good number of investors along with financial institutions from Bangladesh attended the summit.
The summit started with the welcome speech by Jim McCabe, CEO, SCB, Bangladesh followed by Mashrur Arefin, DMD of The City Bank LTD.
Later, the main session of the event started with the caption of mapping economic growth, risk and regulatory landscape with panelists
Christian De Gunmn, VP, sovereign Risk Group, Moody’s investors’ service,
Radika Kak, Economist, SCB, Johannesburg Zutt, Country Director, Bangladesh World Bank.
K. Mahmood Satter, eminent financial consultant of Bangladesh, moderated the session.
All the panelists focused on discipline work forces, efficient private entrepreneurs for the growth of the RMG sector, tremendous efforts of farmers for growing the agriculture sector, increasing power generation, strong foreign remittance inflow, improvement of social security, good macroeconomic management, positive balance of payment, healthy GDP growth and affordable interest rate for development of the country and attracting investment.
Daily Star editor Mahfuz Anam, OBE chairman Iqbal Shmed and CEO of Seamark Group Shmeem Ahsan, president of BASIS Sonia Bashir Kabir, country manager of Microsoft, Bangladesh Mahmudul Huq, CEO of Well Group of Industries and former President of Bangladesh Malaysia Chamber of Commerce and Industry (BMCCI) Syed Nurul Islam, managing director of Sadat Jute Industry MKM Mohiuddin were, among others, present.
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